Your Excellency, Senior Vice-Minister for Foreign Affairs, Mr.
Yamane,

Prof. Katsu, Vice President of this distinguished university,

panelists and discussants, distinguished guests, ladies and
gentlemen,

Good morning.

Let me say at the outset what a great honour it is for IOM, the
International Organization for Migration, and for me to be able to
visit Japan once again to take part in this workshop. 

Since I was elected as the Director General of IOM in 2008, it
has become a regular pattern for me to visit Japan at least once a
year to attend this forum.  This is my fourth visit to Japan,
and my fourth time taking part in this workshop.

I have come here today to share with you some particularly
poignant sentiments. Last year, it was with deep sadness and shock
that we all learned of the enormous lost of life, destruction and
suffering caused by the Great East Japan Earthquake. So let me, at
10 days before the first anniversary of the tragedy, reiterate our
deep condolences and sympathies from IOM and our staff around world
to the government and the people of Japan, and to all those who
have suffered as a result of this disaster. In particular, I wish
to express our profound admiration for the courageous Japanese
people, and for the resilience and dignity with which they
responded in coping with such an unprecedented national
challenge.

And as a final introductory remark, I would like to congratulate
the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Meiji University for organizing
this workshop and for choosing such an important and
forward-looking theme: "Policies on Foreign Nationals in
Post-Disaster Japan".  I know that together we want to explore
possible options regarding future migration and integration policy
in Japan, which has been challenged by the enormous impact of the
tragic disaster a year ago this month.

With these brief words of introduction, I would like to
underline and highlight three points.

I. Migrant integration in the context of humanitarian
crises

The first point is that a humanitarian disaster, such as an
earthquake, makes migrant integration even more critical and more
compelling.

Human mobility and migration —to quote the new book by
Professor Ian Goldin— "have shaped our present and will
determine our future." Migration is humankind's oldest and original
poverty reduction strategy.  We live an era of greatest human
mobility in recorded history. If the United Nations now says that
there are seven billion people on the planet, and one billion are
in a migratory status, that means that one in every seven persons
on the globe is in a migratory mode. About a quarter of a billion
people are crossing international borders, and three-quarters of a
billion are moving internally within their own countries. We need
to be prepared to make migration a positive experience.

The Vice-Minister has mentioned the demographic challenge we
face today, particularly for a country as industrialized and as
developed as Japan.  For much of the industrialized world,
demography will determine much of our future, as will
disasters.

We also have the digital revolution whereby people are connected
to the internet. That is, about a third of the world knows what is
going on in the rest of the world at any given time. So we need to
deal with migration from that angle.

Human disasters, conflict, social unrest, and political upheaval
test the fabric of society. Crises often produce a remarkable
display of unity, as in the case of Japan on March 11th last year.
But in other societies, crises can also expose fragmentation.

Integration remains one of the biggest challenges in normal
times, and in times of disaster, it becomes an even greater
challenge. In a crisis, the tendency is for the atmosphere to
deteriorate. Migrants are often stereotyped and criminalized in
such periods of change.  We all need to make greater efforts
than ever before to make migrants feel at home: to facilitate their
integration into society, to learn the language, to come to
appreciate the culture and to feel that they are one with the host
nation.

A number of the communities that were struck by the Great East
Japan Earthquake responded remarkably with immediate support
measures for affected migrants. I look forward to hearing at the
workshop today some of the experiences from representatives of
these many affected communities, as well as from migrants on how
they coped with and overcame these challenges. It was an honour for
IOM to be able to contribute to the emergency response in a very
modest way.  We were asked to provide multi-lingual
information services for migrants. We were also asked to provide
humanitarian return assistance to affected migrants who were unable
to go home on their own means. And we were also asked to provide
on-site psycho-social assistance to migrants remaining in affected
areas.

The private sector, with whom I met yesterday, also has a
responsibility to assist migrants in times of crises. We just
evacuated a quarter of a million migrant workers from Libya. Very
few of the companies who brought those migrants there did anything
in terms of fulfilling their responsibility to bring them back home
in the middle of a crisis. We need to look at standard contracts in
the private sector that give companies the responsibility to
support these migrants when disaster strikes.  I would
particularly like to emphasize the need for both the migrant and
the host society to continue building two-way relationships through
the rebuilding phase of affected communities.

Migrants have been important members of society for many years,
and they possess important roles and skills in local communities.
As such, they can contribute to post disaster recovery in Japan and
elsewhere. With its aging populations and negative replacement
rates, countries in the industrialized world, such as Japan, will
become increasingly dependent upon migrant support, especially in
times of disaster. We have entire communities that are aging
communities who have very few young people, and they will need the
support of migrants.

I have learned, for example, that many international students
and migrants in Japan, including those living in the Tohoku region,
participated in the relief and recovery efforts. I also read a
heartwarming story about a Japanese-Brazilian graffiti artist who
went to, stayed, and worked in an evacuation community in the
Miyagi Prefecture, and who transformed the housing there with
colourful images. There are similar stories from other countries.
For example, in Italy after the L'Aquila earthquake migrants
actually assumed a very active role in removing the debris and
assisting relief efforts in general. It is symbolic that the
Japanese word "kizuna" was ranked as the number one kanji of 2011.
Kizuna, a two way relationship, is a foundation for successful
migrant integration.

II. Migrant contributions

That leads me to my second point: the ability of migrants to
contribute in times of crisis. During disaster and in the recovery
period migrants need to be made to feel part of the solution rather
than part of the problem. Migrants want to contribute— and
they can contribute— to the recovery phase in any country
after a disaster, including Japan.

There is a tendency however, on the part of many countries to
adopt negative attitudes and negative policies towards migrants,
particularly when facing natural disasters. In the middle of the
global economic crisis a great tendency was to say, "send the
migrants home", and to otherwise take a negative attitude.

In contrast, our host country, Japan, has taken several very
positive steps to protect and promote migration. The government of
Japan, for example, will launch a point-based system for skilled
migrants later this year. The proposed points system is designed to
provide preferential status for migrants who possess specialized
skills that meet the priorities of Japanese society. This is the
sort of active migration policy that can contribute to revitalizing
society by filling skilled manpower gaps. It also brings
innovation, ideas, talents and skills from diverse cultural
backgrounds into society.

Secondly, despite the disastrous events of March 11th last year,
Japan has continued to implement its pilot project for refugee
resettlement throughout this difficult period.  I have every
impression that Japan intends to maintain this forward-looking
migration policy in overcoming present challenges.

Just yesterday, I had the honour and privilege of meeting with
the Myanmar refugees in this programme.  I was able to listen
to them as they recited a number of poems in the Japanese language,
and made statements about their life in Japan.  I also saw
that a third group of Myanmar refugees is now being prepared in the
northern Thailand refugee camps. Despite its own difficulties,
Japan has continued to support Myanmar refugees.

The triple disaster that struck Japan last year was
unprecedented. It is possible to see some clues for future
migration policy in Japan from the experiences of other countries.
There is no doubt that the courageous Japanese people draw their
own lessons from this experience.

Beyond natural disasters, it is also useful to take a look at
migration policy developments in industrialized countries affected
by the economic crisis. Some destination countries are taking more
restrictive measures against migration as domestic political
pressures rise due to high unemployment rates.

III. Communication for migrants during the
Crisis

My third point is about communication on behalf of migrants
during a crisis. One of the problems we faced during the Great East
Japan Earthquake was to ensure timely and accurate communication
for migrants during the crisis, and to prepare migration policies
for the longer-term. This requires a concerted effort from all
partners in the emergency response period.

Preparation is about ninety percent of the challenge in a
crisis. While Japanese society has remained on high alert and has
been highly effective in emergency preparedness, this has not been
the case for migrants. We must do a better job in preparing them in
the future.

From our experience, I would emphasize how essential it is to
prepare migrants for a new life including the preparation for
disasters. We ourselves are involved in resettling vulnerable
refugees to third countries, including Japan. IOM resettles about
250,000 migrants and refugees every year, including medically
examining and transporting them, and preparing them for the
transition through practical cultural orientation and language
training courses. We also provide similar pre-departure training
for migrants, labour migrants, and students and family
reunification cases. We do this by providing migrants up to date,
accurate and unbiased information about life in the country of
destination.

These presentations include information about migrants' rights
and obligations, as well as the expectations of the receiving
communities. At the same time, we are also helping to assist
communities by giving them awareness raising information through
cultural profiles of the newcomers, and through identifying
possible areas in which cultural conflicts may occur. We will
continue to improve the content and methodology of pre-departure
training in order to prepare migrants for emergency situations.

CONCLUSION

In closing, let me simply reiterate our profound appreciation
for the continued contributions that the government and the people
of Japan are making to global humanitarian issues around the
world.

I have just come back from Somalia, South Sudan, the Democratic
Republic of Congo, and most recently from Haiti. Everywhere I go
the work of the Japanese people and government is very evident in
initiatives that change the lives of people around the globe.

So, I would like to take this time to express my appreciation
once again, and to thank you for this opportunity and the honour of
being a part of this distinguished gathering today.

Thank you very much.